Perhaps the fate of the 25-year-old left-hander isn't the first thing that came to mind when the White Sox finally activated James Shields from the disabled list Sunday morning. Shields is returning from over two months off due to a right lat, and to make room for him, the Sox will not be optioning struggling reliever Gregory Infante, or Holmberg, who Don Cooper admitted was more of a reliever filling in temporarily in the rotation, but placing Miguel Gonzalez on the disabled list with A/C joint inflammation in his throwing shoulder.

It's hard to remember now, but Shields had a promising first three starts to the season. Not promising enough to support a 1.69 ERA going forward, but he was missing bats (23.2 strikeout percentage), throwing a slow curveball, de-emphasizing his fastball, and generally making the adjustments a 35-year-old pitcher needs to make to be a reliable rotation member. It was too soon to start thinking about whether he would be in demand come July, but there was value to having him on the field, in addition to his revered clubhouse presence.

It's not any sort of relief to hear the Gonzalez news. Shoulder problems are scary for any pitcher and a serious A/C joint issue could keep him out for months and jeopardize his season. Carlos Rodon, Zach Putnam, Nate Jones and Shields have all provided useful reminders on how long the recovery from something that sounds like simple inflammation can be. But it does give a why to Gonzalez's serious struggles over the last nine starts — velocity loss, drop in strikeout rate, control issues — that already threatened his hold on a rotation spot. This is the first mention of any injury issue or soreness for Gonzalez, and his recovery timeline is unknown. He's a free agent after this season.

The trickle-down effect is that Infante gets to stay on the roster and work on pushing down a 6.06 ERA spiked by three home runs in 16 1/3 innings. For Holmberg, there's no guarantee, since the White Sox's starter Tuesday in Minnesota is still listed as “to be announced,” but he seems like the logical choice to keep filling in. He's posted a 3.71 ERA over four starts and kept the Sox competitive in every game, but has also averaged just over four innings per outing and likely benefited from a .200 BABIP. He made it clear after his last start on Thursday that he's ready to be a good soldier.

“I'll do whatever they ask me to,” Holmberg said. “I'm here to pitch, here to get outs and here to win ballgames.”

Seems like they'll most likely be asking him to try to give the Sox five innings on Tuesday.

James Fegan is the lead writer on the White Sox for The Athletic Chicago. Previously, James founded and served as Editor-in-Chief of BP South Side, and his work has appeared in Baseball Prospectus, ESPN SweetSpot, The Rock River Times and Athlete's Quarterly. Follow James on Twitter @JRFegan.